


Their Story

by pylades



Category: Newsies!: the Musical - Fierstein/Menken
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-24
Updated: 2014-09-24
Packaged: 2018-02-18 15:22:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 736
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2353154
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pylades/pseuds/pylades
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He's the smartest, most-handsome egotist in the world.</p><p>So, basically, Katherine's Prince Charming.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Their Story

The book is David’s idea.

He’s sitting in the kitchen, little Elizabeth fast asleep in his lap, looking every bit the exhausted father of two. Katherine recognizes the weariness. She even misses it, a little bit.

"Joey makes me tell the story every night, Ma. If I don’t tell it exactly like you and Dad do, he even corrects me." 

Katherine laughs, drying her wet hands on the dish towel. “He’s your child, all right. You used to correct everyone, David, because you absolutely needed to be right about everything.”

From the living room, Jack scoffs. “Wonder where he got that from?”

"You’re supposed to be working, not snooping!" Katherine calls back. "Finish your sketches, Jack."

David grins at his parent’s familiar bickering. “You could always make my life easier and write it down for me.”

"Or you could read the scrapbook of newspaper articles," she reminds him, but David shakes his head.

"That’s not the same, Ma. You add more color to the stories you tell family than your old articles."

"Read between the lines, dear. I don’t need to spell out ‘cocky egomaniac’ for you to know that your father is one."

"I heard that -"

" - You wouldn’t have if you weren’t snooping!"

= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =

"The kid’s idea wasn’t half-bad, yanno."

Katherine pokes her head out of the bathroom, scowling across the room at her husband. “You only think that because you weren’t the one who had to clean gravy out of a lace tablecloth, Jack.”

"What? Nah, not Joey’s potato moat - though that was pretty nifty. He’s just gotta work on his dam buildin’, that’s all." Jack grins.

"He can work on his dam building at his house," Katherine says, sliding between the covers. Her feet are still chilled from the cool tile of the bathroom and she smirks, insinuating them between Jack’s feet.

"Damnit, woman, your feet are like ice!"

"Quit fussing, they’ll warm up on their own."

"They’re not warmin’ up on their own when you’re usin’ my feet to warm ‘em!" He says sternly. "I’ve got half-a-mind —"

"Tell me something I don’t know!" she jokes.

" — not to give ya what I made earlier."

"Jaaaaack, I was just teasing. You’re the smartest -" She busses a dramatic and loud kiss to his cheek.

"Uh huh."

And another kiss. “Most handsome -“

"Keep goin’, Ace."

"— cocky egotist in the world."

"Shoulda stopped you when you were ahead," Jack sighs, reaching behind his pillow for a folded up piece of paper. 

Katherine snatches it from Jack before he can change his mind and unfolds the paper, snuggling against him. It’s broken into a series of small paneled sketches, like the comics that Joey loves so much.

"Is that me?"

"Yep. Standin’ up to your ole man -"

"You drew my father as a dragon, Jack."

"He breathed fire," her husband reminded her.

"Does that make me the Princess, then?" 

He stretches his arm overhead, gently touching a thick lock of hair. It’s shorter than it was back then, as the new styles dictated, and grayer too, but he wasn’t wrong in giving the girl in the sketch a shining tiara. “You know you are, Ace.”

Katherine smiles and kisses him gently. “You’re going to have to add more to this, you know. The Prince in his rolled-up shirtsleeves climbing the Princess’ fire escape.”

"I don’t think David would approve of the story takin’ that turn." Jack leers at her.

She slaps his chest, sputtering. “We didn’t - it didn’t - not every time, Jack!” 

"Yeah, yeah. The lady protest…es too much."

= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = 

They end up writing two very different stories, although the characters - well, they’re very much the same.

It takes six months, but for David and Joey, Katherine assembles all of her old news stories and writes a narrative that any little boy would enjoy reading over and over again.

Jack sketches pictures for it, too. Their friends, some still around, some lost to sickness or the Great War. They’re both a little bit sadder on those days, remembering David’s namesake. Crutchie. Spot and Darcy and Romeo. Thoughts of Joe Pulitzer, too, fill Katherine with that old mixture of anger and sorrow that she’s never quite let go.

And when they need time away from that story, they work on a much more fanciful tale for little Lizzie. A Princess and a dragon. A knight and his band of wayward squires. It’s happy and colorful.

Both stories are their story.

**Author's Note:**

> From the 2013 Newsies Writing Swap (I'm clearly long-delayed in posting it outside of tumblr).
> 
> PROMPT: Jack & Katherine writing/illustrating a children’s book


End file.
